


solivagant

by Lightning of Farosh (Medea_Nunc_Sum)



Series: One Word Character Studies [1]
Category: The Legend of Zelda & Related Fandoms, The Legend of Zelda (Video Game 1986)
Genre: Adventure, Childhood Trauma, Childhood vs Adulthood, Gen, Growing Up, Inner Dialogue, Linktober, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, The Original LOZ Game
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-01
Updated: 2020-10-01
Packaged: 2021-03-08 04:55:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,383
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26739934
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Medea_Nunc_Sum/pseuds/Lightning%20of%20Farosh
Summary: He was asked to collect the eight pieces of Wisdom. Asked to save the princess.Asked to sacrifice his childhood.Someone who travels or wanders the world alone; a solitary wanderer
Series: One Word Character Studies [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1946323
Comments: 8
Kudos: 42





	solivagant

**Author's Note:**

> for my linktober prompt 'beginnings'. a story for the hero of hyrule, the one who started it all (and one of my favourites)

Monsters came in the morning.

They came just before the dawn with their fire and swords and earth bellowing roars. Wood caught ablaze, crops trampled, and screams pierced the darkness.

The people begged for salvation from soldiers cut down at their posts.

The people begged silent goddesses for answers they could not give.

And alone, on the edge of the woods, a young boy grasped the branch of a tree with trembling fingers—not caring about the splinters that dug into his skin—and could only watch as a golden sunrise turned crimson. He watched the village crumble, watched as the corn and beans and people burned.

Giddy grotesque laughs clogged the air, mixing with the smoke.

At the head of the pack, a massive beast strode forth with a pig-like nose, two long tusks, and dented red armour. He bellowed something over the noise and the party continued on, leaving nothing but blood and ashes in their wake.

oOo

The inside of the cave was dark, walls lit only by dim, flickering firelight, and the stairs leading back out into the world were crumbling from rainwater and disuse. Animal carcasses hung in the corner; some already skinned, their pelts waiting off to the side. Others had yet to start, strung up by their feet and staring at the ground with lifeless eyes.

Ash sat heavily on the back of Link’s tongue. Dirt matted his tangled hair, and mud splattered across his tunic. A wooden pommel rested against his palm and someone had taken the time to carve leaves and vines along the hand guard and a strange triangle made of three smaller triangles just above where the hilt became the blade.

The old man who had given it to him was long gone, his fires still burning on either side of where Link stood.

_Won’t you save her? The princess?_

His hand tightened around the pommel as the old woman’s— _Impa,_ her name had been _Impa_ —voice came from the crackling flames. It settled in his chest like a mighty iron weight. She had pleaded, grasping at his shoulders, pointing towards the peak of the shadowed mountain. The shaking in her hands had rattled his bones. 

There was no one else.

_There was no one else._

Link closed his eyes, breathed in the smell of burning villages and the phantom rot of those long gone.

_It’s dangerous to go alone._

The sword was heavy in his hand.

Link lifted it anyway.

oOo

Black clouds stretched across the sky, reaching their hungry, grasping fingers over the horizon. Beneath them, the sun—normally bright and unfiltered—was nothing more than an orange orb floating ominously over the top of Death Mountain. A breeze ruffled through the tops of trees, dragging along gold, red, and brown leaves with it, tossing them about in the air before letting them fall upon fresh carcases.

Energy crackled under Link’s skin and it _burned._

He swung around to the next octorok and watched as a beam of pure magic sliced it in half.

Not from the sword.

Not from the small, hand carved, _wooden_ sword.

Panting beneath the fading sunlight, shoulders drenched with sweat, Link looked down at his hands. There was a splinter in the fleshy part underneath his thumb, scars along his palm from trying to climb trees that didn’t want to be climbed.

Nothing unusual—they were just hands.

He tightened his fingers around the pommel of the sword and felt that energy buzz through his chest like a swarm of hornets in a hive.

Link breathed in and smiled as it bubbled and boiled and crackled like lightning across his bones.

 _Magic_.

Hope.

oOo

There was an island out in the middle of a small lake that had a small rope bridge connecting it to the mainland. It had two wide trees—the one in the middle being the biggest—that were all dead. Link killed the octorok that wandered between them and sat down. An acidic ball of fire had burned away the shoulder of his tunic and his skin ached, though he didn’t dare look at it. 

Someone had carved a face into the biggest tree and the mouth was open, leading downward into the dark.

He wasn’t ready to be swallowed into the abyss.

Not yet.

Stars stretched out above him, their stories spilled across the heavens, and Link leaned against one tree to watch them. His blood-stained sword lay across his lap, the tip chipped by a tektite that had taken more hits than normal to take down.

Rocks towered on either side of the island and he could pretend, for just a moment, that there was no Triforce he needed to collect, no monsters waiting in the waters beyond the bridge, no dark unknown waiting for him to the left.

There was only him and the stars.

Link didn’t have the energy to smile up at them, but he curled up, surrounded by their stories, and rested.

oOo

He touched the Triforce and golden power blazed through his bones.

He touched the Triforce and sobbed as it grabbed hold of him, as it burned within him, as it took everything that he was and put in on a pair of scales to judge.

“Please,” Link shuddered, his face wet with tears, voice cracked from disuse. He didn’t know what he was begging for.

Release from the thin, gold chains wrapping themselves like silk ribbons around his throat and wrists?

Freedom from the pain of power he didn’t want throbbing beneath his flesh?

Mercy from an item that knew no such thing?

_“Please—”_

Jagged golden power settled inside him, carved against him, made a space for itself where there wasn’t before, like a knife digging a hole into a slab of timber. It wasn’t _his._

Link saw a flash of blonde hair—brown hair—black hair, a crown made of silver, made of gold. Thousands of years turned into seconds and seconds turned into millennia. Over and over the cycle went. Courage. Power.

 _Wisdom_.

Destiny cloaked his shoulders as the wooden sword dropped to the floor and Link curled in on himself.

He wasn’t alone anymore.

That was probably the most painful part of all.

oOo

An old woman watched him as he cooked a fish over one of her fires.

She said nothing about the bags under his eyes, about the way he kept scratching at the back of his left hand, about the fact that he kept his sword close and kept looking up at the hole in the cave's side.

That was okay; he didn’t want to say much of anything either.

oOo

Rock slipped beneath aching fingers and Link cursed, pulling away from the cliff to look down at the blood welling in his palm. It mixed with the dirt smeared across his skin, with the mud that had dried long ago, with green stains from when he had tripped and slid against the earth. Above him, the sun stared with a heavy, fiery gaze that still couldn’t pierce through his ribcage to the nugget of cold holding onto his heart.

Sweat dripped down Link’s brow, settling in the collar of his turtleneck. It stuck to his scabs and burned at the newest cuts until they were numb. He flexed his fingers and hissed as they pulled at the bruises along his knuckles.

Water rushed beside him, crashing down into the river below. A rare breeze sent a bit of the spray across his face, cooling his sun flushed skin. High above him, a beast roared, and the sound reverberated through his bones.

 _Just a little higher_ , Link lied and rested his aching palm on the rock. It burned against his skin, throbbed with the ache of three Triforce shards that rested under his skin. _Just a little more_.

The old man had told him to go.

Closing his eyes, Link breathed in to settle the tremble in his shoulders.

Opening them, he began his climb once more.

Humidity and dust settled on his skin, sticking to the air and making every breath heavier. Clouds dotted the far horizon, hovering over the ocean. Some little spark of hope bloomed in Link’s chest, and he wondered if they would come closer to land and wash away the desolation that had claimed Hyrule.

The sun dipped behind Death Mountain, blinking away the heat that lingered in the rocks. An hour passed. A second one followed.

Link gasped and shuddered, trembled and climbed until, at last, he pulled himself up over the edge of the cliff.

Rolling onto his back, he closed his eyes and laid there for a bit, listening to the roaring water as it crashed far below. His arms ached, his knees cracked, but Link sat up anyway to look around.

A small lake sat in the middle of the crater, waters clear and blue and cold. He washed the dried blood and mud off his hands and stared at his reflection. Darkness lined his eyes from too many sleepless nights. A bruise was snaking up the side of his neck, and a healing cut stretched across his cheek. Dirt clung to his face, hiding his freckles away from the world.

How long had it been?

Dragging his fingers through the reflection, Link watched the ripples shatter his visage. It reformed easily enough seconds later, and he stared. His flesh felt hot and too big, like he didn’t quite belong in it just yet.

He took a deep breath, dunked his head under the water, and held it there. It chilled the heat that had pooled beneath his skin and grasped his lungs in a vice. Some part of it was too cold—more of a shock than a gift—but he stayed there until his chest burned, until his mouth wanted to open, until his lungs rebelled against his brain.

Link pulled up and gasped. His hair stuck to his face, curling across his forehead and jaw. Across the water, a horse-man beast snorted and drew its sword.

Gritting his teeth, Link scrambled to his feet and reached for his shield.

oOo

Splinters dug into skin, the broken pieces of a wooden sword grasped tightly in bruised, battered hands. Thunder rumbled above and the darkened clouds blocked out most of the sunset as Link stumbled around the lake. Part of his tunic had been sliced open, his shield burned along the edges, and blood dripped into his eyes, but he was alive.

He was _alive_.

Each step sent a roller of needles up his thigh and he limped towards an opening in the rocks. Maybe the cave would have answers; maybe it would be a place to rest, maybe, maybe, _maybe_.

Link sat down at the entrance and watched as light flickered across the heavens. It would take the ashes, he knew, and make it into muck, into dirt, into so many things. Perhaps the rain will catch the smoke in the sky and bring it all down upon the monsters who gave it birth to begin with.

The first drop landed in the lake, the second one in the pool of blood by the horse-man’s body. Link leaned against the side of the cave and sighed, watching as the rain blocked out the horizon. It smeared the rocks against the sky like a water colour painting until the storm swallowed them both. A breeze ruffled his hair, the heat from earlier in the day fleeing back into the cracks and crevices to wait until the sun returned.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?”

Grasping a jagged piece of his broken sword, Link whirled around.

A man stood behind him, surrounded in the cave's shadow where it dipped further into the earth. He had a long, white beard that curled over a set of red robes and leaned heavily on a twisted, withered cane.

“They say that a storm is the earth’s way of cleansing herself,” the old man walked closer to the entrance, refusing to look away from the small flashes of light in the distance. The end of his cane tapped against the rock in time to the rain. “After all the things she’s been through these past few weeks, I hope that’s the case.”

Link watched the old man with narrowed eyes. The edges of his broken sword dug into his palm, breaking open cuts that had stopped bleeding a few minutes ago.

At last the wizened face turned from the storm to look down at his bruised face and bloodied tunic, at last it took in the broken sword in his hands and the tired, resigned look upon his face. “I suppose,” the old man mused, “if you killed the beast with nothing more than a stick...”

Link blinked.

There was a hum. A sigh.

“Come,” the old man said, motioning Link to follow as, step by step, he made his way back into the darkness. “I have something for you.”

oOo

Heat seeped through the dungeon floor, grabbing hold of trembling knees to drag them down with whispered promises of sleep and rest, and _aren’t you so tired after climbing for so long? Maybe you should sit down for just a moment. The monsters can wait just a little longer._

Link gulped down the last of his water and wiped his arm across his forehead. Sweat seeped into his tunic, sticking the heavy cloth to his chest and back. Glittering green stone was cracked beneath his boots, threatening to crumble at any moment. Some places in the floor were chipped and sections of it had broken off the wall, leaving nothing but a whole with strange, jagged layers.

Lines blurred, the world darkened around the corners. Link swayed, gasping for air that dragged blazing nails down the back of his throat and turned his tongue to a lump of sticky sandpaper. It felt too big in his mouth and he swallowed, hoping to find some saliva to ease his parched throat.

There was none.

 _You must keep going_ , a voice begged in the back of his mind. It burned not with heat, but with golden power. _Steady, Link_.

His new white sword was heavy in his hand, the pommel slick with sweat and sticking uncomfortable to his fingers.

Link tightened his hold on it and took a step further into the dungeon.

oOo

Another tree burned.

Another wall destroyed.

_No, no; I can’t tell—_

_It’s a secret to **everybody**_.

oOo

“Nice doing business with you, kid,” a shopkeeper said, handing over a small, blue ring. It surrounded Link, engulfing him with a pale blue light that wrapped around his shoulders.

He breathed in, and the magic tasted like spring.

oOo

Water splashed up Link’s sides, and he groaned, sinking into the spring. A tree hung over his head, blocking the sun as coolness seeped into his skin, settling heavily in his muscles. It chased away the burning that had been clawing at the bones and the aching feeling deep in his chest—the one that had tried to make him one with the ash in the sky—cowered.

Behind him on the shoreline was his pile of items, shed like a snake skin and left there. His new flute was on the top, brass glinting in the fading sunlight.

Link ran his fingers in the water and lowered his arms, sighing as it seeped through his tunic. It lapped at his stomach and he scooted further, deeper along the rocky bottom before realizing that his boots were still on. He laughed as he removed them and his socks, tossing both with little care back towards the shore. Toes free, he wiggled them, stretched them, rubbed them against algae covered stones.

The sun settled further along the horizon and Link laid back to drop his head beneath the water.

Sound drifted lazily around his ears, muffled by the coolness that soothed his aching soles and tired soul. The burning in his cheeks faded, replaced by an ache in his lungs.

It was a different burning, a lovely burning.

He surfaced with a laugh and wiped his bangs away from his face.

Pink darted around the corner of his vision and he jerked, startled out of his momentary relief by a creature with four insect like wings.

Link stared at the fairy.

The fairy stared right back.

“H-hello,” Link lifted his hand, waving his fingers at her.

Giggling, the fairy darted forward, brushing glowing fingers against his sunburnt cheek and easing the throbbing beneath his skin.

“Hello,” she said.

oOo

Link gasped as hands closed around the front of his tunic, wrenching him off the floor only to slam him back down. He scrambled for his sword, for his boomerang, for his shield as bloodshot eyes stared at him from behind a shaggy, untrimmed white beard.

“How did you find me?” the old man croaked, broken fingernails digging into Link’s skin. “How did you get here?”

“I-I—”

Hands tugged at his under tunic, at his bag, at the small, barely repaired sack hanging from his belt—

Seams split and rupees scattered across the floor. They caught the light around their edges, glittering like gold in the firelight.

Bloodshot eyes landed on them and the old man’s breathing quickened.

Link held still, trembling and not daring to breathe.

The old man lunged for the rupees, gathering them up.

Scrambling to his feet, Link ran up the broken stairs.

He didn’t notice the tears streaming down his cheeks until he was hidden back in the woods, hands clasped over his mouth to muffle his ragged, gasping sobs.

oOo

Lynels roared their challenges to the sky, their blades rusted from blood already spilled.

Link gritted his teeth and left nothing but their rotting corpses in his wake.

oOo

Stone groaned, grumbled, crumbled as he pushed and the crypt opened beneath his feet, stairs vanishing into the dark. He was careful with his steps, holding the candle forward as roots caught in his tangled hair and in the torn parts of his sleeves.

One of the old men waited for him at the bottom.

Link flinched back into the shadows, watching with wide eyes. Part of him wanted to scramble back up to the graveyard and take his chances with the ghosts.

“Why do you hide in the shadows?” The old man said, not looking up from the fire head was feeding with broken bits of wood. “Come out, boy.”

Link hesitated, then took a small step into the light. Blood was across his sleeves, a bruise was crawling up the side of the neck, and some of his hair was blackened around the edges from where a lucky Zora had caught him on the shoulder.

The old man looked over him and frowned. “No,” he said, taking in the child that trembled on the edge of shadow and light. “You’re not strong enough.”

Something in Link’s chest grabbed a hold of his heart and _squeezed_.

“Come back when you’re ready.”

oOo

_Link._

He stumbled, shoulder hitting the wall of the dungeon. The floor turned beneath him, lines in the stone blurring and multiplying. His eyes hurt, his hand hurt, his back, his legs, his _heart_ hurt.

_Link._

A cackle echoed through the walls and he saw a robe flicker out of the corner of his eye as another Wizzrobe formed. It’s gleeful, sharpened face watched him, lips pulling back into a sharpened, dagger-like smile.

Link stumbled out of the way of rippling magic and brought his sword down upon its chest.

The creature wailed as it died, the sound piercing through his body like a hundred tiny needles.

_LINK._

He hit the ground, falling into the abyss of unconsciousness.

oOo

A hundred thousand lifetimes passed.

Link fell, stepping out past the cave, beaten down by spears, by rocks, by metal that clawed its way up underneath his feet.

Thousands of eyes watched him, peering back from the future (from the past) as he burned, as he sobbed, as he searched and searched and prayed for answers.

He was the first.

He was the last.

oOo

 _Why me?_ Link asked the pieces of the broken power that had settled under the surface of his skin. They, too, were barely held together by sinew and blood and ever-changing salt water. _Why did you choose me?_

A breeze came over the trees and sent ripples through the water, a fish darted between tree roots tangled together to create a makeshift home.

The voice belonging to the shattered, golden power didn’t answer.

Link sighed and reached for his sword. The burns along his sides and back were still fading, his chest throbbed with every breath, and the muscles along his forearm protested as he lifted his heavy sword.

It was only when he was walking away from the comfort of the cool water that the Triforce of Wisdom responded.

 _I didn’t_ , it said.

Link bit his bottom lip and breathed in.

That was okay. It was okay.

He shivered.

Something warm pulsed up through his hand.

 _But,_ the Triforce continued, _if I had a choice, I wouldn’t have chosen anyone other than **you**._

oOo

Energy crackled, bursting from young fingers. The metal rod buzzed in Link’s hand, turning into a focus for the lightning that had been burning under his skin for the past couple months, years, a _lifetime_.

And it tasted like _magic_.

oOo

 _What will happen when you’re complete?_ Link asked as he climbed up past the Lynels and faced rows upon rows of statues. They stared at him as he passed, unmoving soldiers frozen in time.

 _I don’t know_ , the Triforce said. It sounded sad.

Link hadn’t realized it could feel anything.

The sun was blistering above his head, the smoke no longer stung the back of his throat. His palms were roughened like the sand beneath his boots and the rocky cliffs stretching higher and higher on the surrounding mountain side.

Light glinted off stone that was almost metal and, one by one, Link activated the statues. One by one, he dug his white sword into their stone-made-flesh.

The last one hid a bracelet that sent strength pulsing through his scarred veins.

Link took it and headed back to the graveyard.

oOo

The old man looked upon the fresh scars on his face, upon the fury that glinted in Link’s eyes, upon his stubbornness and resolve and the line of his jaw as he stuck his chin out.

“ _Good_ ,” he held out a scabbard with a sword made of silver metal and crimson gems. “This is the Magic Sword.”

The hands that took it were steady.

oOo

Water drained from an abandoned fairy fountain, the remains of the creatures that had once lived there claimed by the ever hungry nature of corrupted power.

The fortress beneath trembled beneath Link’s rage.

“How dare you!” He cried, cutting down the snakes and skeletons and dragons that had been left behind. The Magic Sword blazed with his fury, drenched in dark monster blood. Every strike was for a fairy they had chased away, every crop they had burned, every village they had destroyed.

It wouldn’t bring any of it back.

Link knew that.

He _knew_ it.

Parts of his soul ground together, no longer belonging to the helpless boy that had cowered at the edge of the woods. Death didn’t make him any less of a child. It didn’t make him any more of a man.

It was just there, rotting against the back of his throat as he gritted his teeth and swallowed back the tears that threatened to rise to the surface.

oOo

The Triforce of Wisdom was silent as he picked up the seventh piece.

oOo

Fires came to life easily beneath Link’s hands and warmth soaked back into the rock, leaving long scars of amber across the stone. He placed his raft across the floor, his bow against the wall, the sword and shield where he could reach them. A plank of wood sat beside one pit, two fish nailed to the surface.

Fingers dragged through dust, drawing Lynels with bulging bug-eyes and moblins with heads so large they threatened to topple over. The layer of grey hid away any sign of the old man that had first lived there—and the wooden sword he had given away.

Had it been a curse? A blessing? Time was supposed to tell him which one, but Link still wasn’t able to put together the puzzle.

Fish meat continued to cook and the smell of rain drifted down the stairs, mixing with the burning wood and dry dust. Link leaned up against one pillar and watched as the first bit of water dripped into the cave.

There were scars along his arms, along his legs, along his ribs and shoulders and face that hadn’t been there when he first started. A story etched in flesh that sang of trials that weren’t over.

Not yet.

 _Do you remember what it was like before this?_ The Triforce said, voice quiet in the tired evening.

Link breathed in the smell of fish, the smell of rain, the smell of blood and steel and war. He closed his eyes and tried to remember what it felt like in front of a hearth, tried to picture being held by kind arms, and couldn’t.

The gaze of monsters clung to the darkness instead of worn blankets and the musk of goat.

Link opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling, searching for stars that weren’t there.

 _No_ , he admitted. _I can’t_.

oOo

“What is this?” Link ran his fingers over leather, tracing the green design etched across a book cover. The whole thing creaked, pages worn and musty. Its ink was faded, but not so much that it couldn’t be read.

The Hylian and fae language was printed across the parchment, notes scrawled along the sides. Some of it was frantic, some of it was simple. Diagrams, sketches, descriptions. He looked over a twisted rendition of a Lynel, mouth open, face turned back to face the sky as it roared. It stated their strengths. Their weaknesses.

In the back, there was a rod. A familiar rod.

Link picked his head up and looked at the wand he had stolen from the dungeon filled with Wizzrobes.

oOo

Water of Life bubbled in a cauldron, stirred lazily by the old woman. She hummed under her breath, no longer silent and watchful, but welcoming him into her small cave with a smile.

Sitting in the corner, Link used one of her fires to read over the pages in the book. The Triforce whispered words into his ear when he couldn’t understand what was written across the pages. Next to him, the magic wand had the bulb on the top unscrewed.

_‘Adjust the focus and you can heighten the energy that is released.’_

He rested the book on his lap and looked down at the glass bulb. It was warm when he picked it up, the glass flickering in shades of yellows, oranges, and reds.

An ache settled beneath his skin. The same kind that burned when he used his sword and, now, when he swung the magic wand.

“It pulls its magic from you,” the old woman said.

Link lifted his head and looked back at her.

She was hovering over her cauldron still, eyes bright despite the shadows across her face. “That rod, there. Its magic comes from you.”

Blinking once, Link stared at her before turning his attention back to the rod. Tiny runes were etched along the base in a language he didn’t recognize.

_From... me?_

oOo

He wandered looking for the last piece of the Triforce, stumbling through the caverns and maze of Death Mountain, digging through the sands of the desert, sailing across rivers and parts of the bay. Wisdom was quiet during their search as days passed them by.

Massive stone knights woke under Link’s touch and were silent when they crumbled. Moblins begrudgingly handed him rupees, and he scrounged up enough to buy the expensive blue ring from the shopkeeper hidden beside the lagoon.

On and on he went, the sun beating down across his shoulders, the air humid and biting at his skin.

There was a tree in the middle of a pathway. It opened up into a grey stone labyrinth.

Link hesitated before he entered, the not quite completed Triforce throbbing under his skin.

But he had to go on.

So he did.

oOo

_Spectacle Rock is an entrance to Death._

oOo

Gold was cool against bruised, battered fingers and blood smeared beneath a thumb, painting the lion’s head crimson. Link’s breath was ragged, and he leaned against the wall, shoulders trembling, breathing ragged. “I—” He tried, swallowed, wiped his nose with his arm.

Cuts lined his arms and legs, crimson was smeared across his cheek.

 _Take a break,_ the Triforce of Wisdom murmured, voice warm in his thoughts. _Take care of yourself_.

 _But I’m so close,_ Link closed his eyes. _We’re so **close**. _

His knees gave out beneath him and stone caught on the back of his tunic as his body slid down the wall.

 _Rest,_ the Triforce told him. _Please, Link._

oOo

The full, completed Triforce throbbed on Link’s left hand. It was too much power. It was not enough power. Gold burned and burned and _burned_.

Link left a fish to cook over his small campfire and stared down at his scarred skin. No sign of golden power was etched across his flesh, no sign it was sitting beneath his skin.

“What—” His voice was choked, broken. Smoke in the air and weeks of disuse clung to the corners of his throat. “What now?”

Magic settled inside of him, welling up in his chest, blazing like rivers of fire through his veins.

Link swallowed.

 _Spectacle rock,_ the Triforce said, _is an entrance to Death._

Shuddering, Link closed his eyes and tightened his hand around the magic sword.

oOo

_It’s a secret to everybody._

_It’s a secret to everybody._

_It’s a secret—_

oOo

The steps leading up Death Mountain seemed gold beneath heavy sunlight. Heat waves lifted from the stone and twisted corners of canyon walls and shifted the horizon closer and further. Link felt sweat drip down his brow. It tasted of salt and copper.

Roars of monsters echoed across the rising rock, their challenges shouted to the open, blue sky. They snarled when they saw him. They gurgled when they fell. Dust and dirt stuck to where their blood was drying on Link’s boots, but he kept going.

Thorny bushes tried to hold on to his boots and scrape up his legs, and the plants seemed to shrink beneath the lack of water. To the south, he could see the forests, the lagoon, and the towering dead trees that marked his first dungeon. Light glittered off the surface of the ocean and, from that height, there were no signs of the monsters lurking around every corner, of the creatures waiting to pounce at any misstep.

It was simple, it was beautiful.

Link turned away to head further up the mountain. Stone cut into his hands as he climbed. The weight of the sword, the shield, and the wand clung to his shoulders. Bombs weighed down his bag, a quiver bounced against his hip.

He had everything he needed.

He wasn’t prepared at all.

oOo

Lynels lay dead in the dirt, their blue bodies bright against the brown sand. To the west, the sun was vanishing along the horizon and shadows stretched across the mountain side.

Sharp, stinging acid hovered in the air as the last of the bomb smoke drifted away and, in the side of Spectacle Rock, there was a hole.

Link breathed in. He breathed out.

_Are you ready?_

His gaze turned down to the Triforce on his left hand. Was he? Could he ever be?

Fingers tightened around the hilt of his sword. Blood dripped off the end, creating speckled patterns in the dust. Darkness spread around him, the sky carved in purples and reds and golds.

Squaring his shoulders, Link stepped forward onto the stairs, out of the heat and onward to carve his place into destiny.

The legend, after all, has only just begun.

oOo

_It’s dangerous to go alone._

_Take this._

**Author's Note:**

> We'll see how long i work with linktober on this one sdkjh  
> you can find my prompt list on my [blog](https://lightning-of-farosh.tumblr.com/linktober). the smaller ones will be posted over there


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